Guy Bates, Divisional Director for Estates, XMA
Nigel Akers, IT Diploma Co-ordinator, Nottingham City
Clive Gee, 14-19 Strategy Lead, Manchester City Council
Mike Ryan, Managing Director, Idaho Technology Ltd
Chris Perry, Head of ICT, Newhall Green High School
Narrator: Working with employers at the planning stages of the Diploma can help consortia gain an outside perspective on employer involvement.
For Nottingham City Consortium, involving local employer XMA in their planning meetings has helped to both inform their engagement strategy and develop their curriculum plan.
Guy Bates, Divisional Director for Estates, XMA: We’ve worked since the year 2000 with the Djanogly City Academy and Djanogly asked us whether we would actually get involved in it, because Djanogly were leading the IT Diploma in Nottingham and playing a pivotal role in the pilot. So, they invited us along to the first meeting. We thought this is a fantastic opportunity for us to get involved. It brought in all the corporate social responsibility elements that are important to us as a business, and working with the local community as well just makes sense for us as a business that employs 400 people locally. So, we were asked to contribute and thought, wow, this is something we can really add to.
Nigel Akers, IT Diploma Co-ordinator, Nottingham City: We have had one, sometimes two, people from XMA come to all of our partnership meetings right from the word go. It’s absolutely brilliant the amount of support they’ve given us right from the word go. So, they’ve come to the meetings, they contribute to the meetings they give us ideas.
Guy Bates: XMA wanted to play a part in the consortium because the consortium needed to work with local businesses who had opportunities for work placements, and also people who wanted to provide input on the IT Diploma. Clearly it was useful if they had a background in IT and that’s our business. So we wanted to be able to inform the consortium of the opportunities in terms of technology both for the courses and also for themselves in terms of their logistics and just making things work.
Narrator: Manchester Consortium agrees that involving employers in the initial planning develops realistic expectations of what can be achieved for everyone involved in Diploma delivery.
Clive Gee, 14-19 Strategy Lead, Manchester City Council: I’m a strong believer in trying to get employers involved from day one. Generally speaking, I've found with employers that if you can tell them what you want, rather than some vague notion, they can more easily say yes or no. So they prefer a straight question to which they can give you straight answer. But I also think, if we’re trying to build ownership of the Diplomas generally, in terms of currency value and a quality product, then we need the employers to be able to have a say from day one as to what that Diploma looks like.
Mike Ryan, Managing Director, Idaho Technology Ltd: I’d like them to really get a bit of insight, and then get fired up. They'll really want to stay in this industry.
Chris Perry, Head of ICT, Newhall Green High School: Mike was very involved in talking to us about how employers could help us and he mentioned the need for this very targeted approach.
Mike Ryan: Hello, my name is Mike. I run a company called Idaho, and for 11 years we’ve been doing digital work.
Chris Perry: Having employers involved early was very good, it helped us to know that there were some people already keen and involved and interested and ready to give up their time to help us.
Mike Ryan: I’m secretary of a trade association in Manchester, called Manchester Digital, and for a long time now all our members have been saying how difficult it’s been to recruit people directly from education courses. And the opportunity for Diplomas, where we could actually directly influence what is being taught and actually liaison with industry, seemed the ideal vehicle to see how we can engage as 400 employers to make sure that we can provide better support for this as it scales up. We all want to engage. It’s making it easy for us and making it possible.
Narrator: The early development of an employer engagement strategy can increase practitioners' awareness of organisations that can help with Diploma delivery.
Nigel Akers: All the work that we have done with the employers has been really useful because the point of the Diploma is it’s not what you just teach in a classroom, it’s trying to relate what happens in the Diploma courses with what happens in the real word.
Guy Bates: It feels really meaningful to be part of a community that we don’t necessarily meet with every time, but we always know what’s going on and we always know if there are opportunities for us to contribute.
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